8 ms·

That's the kind of trauma that stays with someone for their whole life, and not a very nice thing to do to your kid. I hope you can make sure that he sees water

by stereo 2y ago

That's the kind of trauma that stays with someone for their whole life, and not a very nice thing to do to your kid. I hope you can make sure that he sees water as something fun and not threatening as he grows up.

jtriangle 2y ago
Mercifully, you don't really start forming strong memories until you're about 3-4, and your brain is gloriously plastic until around 23, so, to say 'that's the kind of trauma that stays with someone for their whole life' isn't really the case. They might be a little timid around water, but, get them in swim classes in a year or so, and they'll be zooming around in no time without a care in the world.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- lazyasciiart 2y ago
  Unfortunately not true. Babies who experience trauma may never be able to tell you about it, but they will remember it the same way they remember that their parents are safe people: it shows up in their emotions, their nervous system, their reactions to stimuli that seem innocuous. In other words “there appears to be a reorganization of cognitive and memory functions such that narrative memory for events prior to age three or four are difficult to access later in life. These two points have led to the pervasive, inaccurate and destructive view that infants do not recall traumatic experience…” https://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_interest/child_law/resources/child_law_practiceonline/child_law_practice/vol-33/february-2014/special-considerations-for-traumatized-infants/ https://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_interest/child_law...
  - navane 2y ago
    pretty sure that getting born trumps any trauma you can give a 2 yr old.
    - tux3 2y ago
      I'm not sure how you're so sure. People being born isn't a new development. If it were significantly harmful, evolutionary pressure would have had ample time to apply. On the other hand, I can think of plenty of trauma that wouldn't be good for a 2 year old child.
      - navane 2y ago
        On second thought, of course there is plenty of trauma you can give a two yr old, my brain happily didn't go there during my earlier reply. I meant by actions of a parent with good intentions.
  - smeej 2y ago
    And if their parents aren't safe people, they remember that too. I experienced feeling truly, deeply, completely safe for the first time in my thirties. It rocked my world. Things almost didn't seem real immediately afterward, like I was dreaming. I compare it to visiting France when I could speak Spanish, but not French. My brain wanted to reply to people in "not English," so kept trying to spit out Spanish responses to French questions. My brain didn't have a context for "safe" other than "not real life," so it tried to react like I was dreaming. I don't want to go into all the details about what it's like to try to teach your parasympathetic nervous system how to come fully online when you're this far into adulthood, but I recommend making sure children do have somewhere they can practice coming down from stress way before they're my age.
    - MichaelZuo 2y ago
      But this is just a feeling, not reality? e.g. The risk of being instantly erased by a falling meteorite/random airplane part/space debris/etc. is never literally zero. Just very very low.
      - smeej 2y ago
        My sister died very suddenly, apparently fine one minute and irrecoverably dead the next. I know I'm never completely safe. Maybe the better term in this case is "protected," but I'm not sure. "This person, here with me, is not a threat to me, and I know that in my bones. Further, he would interpose himself between me and any threat that should arise in this moment." That's the feeling. Most people experience that as infants. Parents are supposed to love their children this way. And it's important for the neurological development of the parasympathetic nervous system. I just didn't get to until my thirties.
    - lazyasciiart 2y ago
      Absolutely: it’s only because of the tremendous impact of lacking felt safety as an infant that we know they can tell the difference.
- NobodyNada 2y ago
  I have strong memories of significant-to-me events that happened when I was 1-2 (moving houses, falling out of bed as an infant, getting scratched by the family cat, and the birth of my sister, just to name a few).
  - sethammons 2y ago
    My earliest memory is at about 18 months. We dramatically underestimate the ability to think and reason for very young kids. Laying down memories included. I believe memories are more likely to set in when an experience is novel and new. Big events like you cite fall into that territory. I think a lot of those who can't remember things before age 5-6 is because they had extra-stable environments.
  - TehShrike 2y ago
    What did you remember about the birth of your sister?
- HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
  Do you not have any memories from <3? This is obviously false. I have memories from when I was 2 that my parents also remember.
  - lelanthran 2y ago
    > I have memories from when I was 2 that my parents also remember. I doubt it. How can you tell the difference between real memories and implanted memories[1]? Children as old as 11 have been successfully implanted with memories of things that never occurred by their parents, and who later testified that their parents told them nothing! [1] Your parents told you at age 4 what you did at age 2, you remembered the act because it was told to you, you don't remember the act of them telling you.
    - gnyman 2y ago
      No need to question the previous comments experiences. Is there really anything which is "certain" when it comes to memories? I'm not a memory expert, but as I recently read a book on the subject I think I have better than average understanding of it. If you can read Swedish or Finnish I do recommend it, the title is "Minnets Makt" by Julia Korkman (freely translated "The power of memory", official title is "Memory Dependent")[1]. The book taught me a lot about how memories work, how they are formed, recalled and modified during the years. And as memories are a core part of everyone's life, I think it would be good for more people to understand them better. I did find a youtube video where the author, does a short lecture meant for law enforcement to teach them the basics of how memories work. As for them it is even more important to understand how meories, especially the recall of memories work when they interview people. Disclaimer, I haven't watched it yet, only skimmed it but it does seem to cover the same concepts as in the book. I recommend spending 27 minutes watching it for anyone who's curious about how the memory work. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSyEs6feH0M&t=442s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSyEs6feH0M&t=442s [1] https://www.helsinkiagency.fi/memory-dependent/ https://www.helsinkiagency.fi/memory-dependent/
    - The_Colonel 2y ago
      > How can you tell the difference between real memories and implanted memories[1]? Let's say something emotionally significant happened to you at the age of 2. Because it was significant, you keep recalling it regularly, maybe every week or so. Recalling and thinking about the memory is also strengthening it (and often altering it). There's not enough time to forget it if you keep refreshing the memory of it (kinda like LRU cache). I have a couple of such early memories which I believe survived through this recall mechanism.
- jajko 2y ago
  None of what you wrote says there was no long lasting trauma, I am pretty confident there is even if onlyin subtle ways. Have you ever heard about sub-consiousness? People behaving erraticaly without really controlling this aspect. Ever met a person who was definitely not balanced down deep and even he/she couldnt point out why? I've met unfortunately many of those without even trying, they are all around us if you know what to look for/ask right questions. Good for OP for testing such an extreme stuff so rest of us dont have to mess up out kids. I would never do such tests on my small kids, even remote chances for something bad is just cruel. Also, he writes it takes even 3s to drown a child, while describing doing even more.
- ordu 2y ago
  > Mercifully, you don't really start forming strong memories until you're about 3-4 You do. It is just childhood amnesia kicks in at some point, and you lose an access to those memories. There is no accepted explanation what happens, I personally prefer the idea, that your memory qualitatively changes in spite of language acquisition, you get another (upgraded) way to access your memory, and then you forget the old (legacy) way. I like this explanation because my own memories from the time I was ~3 yo are strange (conditionally on I could reproduce them well and not to invent things), they are almost eidetic. But it doesn't matter to be frank, because your memories were active and accessible at some period of your life and they influenced your development already, maybe changing the development track completely. Father throwing his kind into a pool? Kid was terrified? It is a very emotional experience which is a betrayal of kid's trust, which probably will never be without limits again. It may destroy any trust to other humans as well. Though it may pass without any long term consequences also. People are unpredictable in this regard. But you'd better avoid such experiments with your kid. > your brain is gloriously plastic until around 23, so, to say 'that's the kind of trauma that stays with someone for their whole life' isn't really the case. Some things a sticky. If they are strong enough to change behavior at once, if the changed behavior becomes a habit, then habit will enable trauma to resist any brain's plasticity and ability to heal. And you know, it may be a very rational thing for a kid to stop trusting his father if the father can throw the kid into water just so without any thought of how kid will feel. Probably the kid should be wary around his father.
  - The_Colonel 2y ago
    > I personally prefer the idea, that your memory qualitatively changes in spite of language acquisition, you get another (upgraded) way to access your memory, and then you forget the old (legacy) way. I like this explanation because my own memories from the time I was ~3 yo are strange (conditionally on I could reproduce them well and not to invent things), they are almost eidetic. I think people stick too much to the idea that human memory is kinda like computer memory. "Remembering" trauma could also mean that the brain's structure changes in some way as a result of trauma without necessarily recording how the event exactly went. Reminds me of a video of WW1 shell shocked soldiers I saw recently. It's not the exact memory record of the events which broke those men. Something more profound changed in their brain.
- bowsamic 2y ago
  Freud would like a word
- danielbarla 2y ago
  I can confirm from personal experience that traumatic experiences seem to transcend the mind-wipe that happens in mid-childhood. At a very early age, I had a form of Krupp, and some of my earliest memories are not being able to breathe, and the panic/anxiety of it. After several decades, it's something I hardly ever think about (somewhat backing up what you are saying), but I definitely remember it. I would also be hesitant to do this to kids on purpose. My son fell into a pool at the age of ~1, and was pulled out by my wife within a few seconds. However, he had a massive fear of water, and took a long time and concerted efforts to make him comfortable with learning to swim.
  - saithound 2y ago
    If you had an infection of the upper airway that made it hard to breathe, you had croup. If there was a massive steel foundry pushing down on your chest, it was probably Krupp.
    - danielbarla 2y ago
      You're right (though it is actually spelled krupp in my language, and I assumed it would be the same in others, as it has no inherent meaning).
- sdiupIGPWEfh 2y ago
  > Mercifully, you don't really start forming strong memories until you're about 3-4... A popular misconception that needs to be challenged, and one that I fear encourages some non-negligible deal of neglect and abuse. Children under 4 years old have surprisingly excellent memories, extending years back. But something happens around age 4, possibly a burst of neurogenesis, which scrambles most of whatever episodic or autobiographical memory is in the brain. Other forms of memory endure the transition just fine. Motor skills are obviously retained, as are other life-long skills like how to speak (and for the hyper-literate, how to read). Acquired fears certainly survive, and though they can be overcome... they're still around to actually have to be overcome. Early childhood trauma, and especially abuse, absolutely leave an imprint, even if the events themselves are no longer clearly recalled.
- smeej 2y ago
  I'd recommend reading Bessel van der Kolk's The Body Keeps the Score. The conscious mind is far from the only place the body stores memory that can impact us later in life.
wruza 2y ago
Idk if I was exposed to it like that, but I hate waters and don’t understand how the risk of death by drowning can be seen as “something fun”. I can swim to the shore if thrown out of boat, but see your deep bath “fun” as a group suicide tickling event. One choke, leg cramp, kick in the head and you’re in grave danger. I’d better walk the border on the roof rather than swimming through somewhere I can’t stand up.
graynk 2y ago
One of my first memories is drowning. We were going down the river and our plot crashed into a fallen tree and turned over. I was in a life saving jacket and I was about 3 or 4 years old. I remember the sun shining through the green-ish water, but I don’t remember being afraid at all. I was quickly fished out and then I just sat on that same tree and wiggled my legs and enjoyed myself while everyone else scrambled to save the things from swimming away. I’m also pretty sure that I was thrown into the sea to teach me to swim at some point, but I have no recollection of that, just stories from my parents. That is to say - I love swimming and feel positively untraumatized by the whole thing, even though it is scary in retrospect. Everyone’s experience is different, just my anecdata point to add.
- ygra 2y ago
  For me it was my swimming instructor in school that just pushed me into the water when I was afraid to jump in. I can swim, but I never got any of the swimming badges and I'm to this day (30+ years later) very uncomfortable with my head under water or even water in my face.
bowsamic 2y ago
He SHOULD see water as threatening
- twixfel 2y ago
  But not his own father! Running dangerous experiments on your child without their consent is surely at best extremely unethical. To me it sounds positively sick, or in layman terms, psychopathic.
  - 392 2y ago
    Every generation before me was taught to swim by being tossed in a pond. It's a dangerous world. Pretending it isn't just lowers the minimum required stress before anxiety takes over.
    - smeej 2y ago
      Why add dangers, though? Even just perceived ones? It's perfectly possible to teach children to swim without giving them the experience of fearing for their lives.
    - twixfel 2y ago
      Yes the world is a little bit more dangerous for that kid at least. At any moment his father might throw him in a lake with neither consent nor warning. I never had to worry about my parents experimenting on me and I simply learned to swim with lessons. Lucky me to have had such parents. What makes it worse is that OP described it as an experiment that was primarily for his benefit, because he wanted to see what it would look like to see kid drowning. No word of wanting his kid to learn something (which still wouldn’t have been ok but at least barely makes a tiny bit of sense). That is mental, and child abuse.
    - 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y ago
      Coincidentally the older people who grew up that way and are proud of it are unbearable pricks
    - 2y ago
blarg1 2y ago
I still have my first memory of going in a pool, I just jumped straight in and I was doing kind of star jumps with my head popping in and out of the water, while my mum took her sweet arse time fishing me out. I remember being annoyed at that for a while lol.
- sentfromrevolut 2y ago
  [dead]
madaxe_again 2y ago
I’ve let my toddler fall in the pool - the first few times were enough, and she’s now really careful anywhere near it - and still perfectly comfortable with getting in the water appropriately, with a parent. As for trauma - it really depends. In her case, pretty sure she’s fine as in each case she was promptly rescued and as mentioned, no aversion to water, just to falling in. In my case - I managed to have an earnest crack at drowning nearly a decade ago, aged 30 or so, and it hasn’t left me. Swimming between two small tropical islands. Tide changed. Calm waters suddenly became ferocious chop, and I swiftly realised I was being swept out to sea, and couldn’t fight the current - and I’m a respectable swimmer. Panic set in faster than I care to admit as I realised that I was pretty fucked. Thank my lucky stars, someone was watching me, and appeared with a rib as I was starting to take lungfuls of water. I was purple, coughing up and vomiting seawater, sobbing. Humbling. I’ve no problem with water in general since, but the ocean now scares the shit out of me, and I won’t get in it.
meheleventyone 2y ago
Particularly as it’s something you can easily learn about without doing that!
tmcdos 2y ago
I have such a trauma. When I was at 2nd grade in primary school, they were bringing us to the nearest pool at a stadium for swimming lessons. The teacher was asking us to jump one by one in the water and to try getting closer to a life-bouye. Most of my schoolmates were able to catch the bouye but at the moment I jumped in the water, I froze and started sinking. I was able to feel how the teacher touched a long metal stick to my arm which I grabbed and she pulled me out. Then she yelled at me why have not I tried to swim. I will never forget this experience. After 40 years, I still can not swim.

by stereo 2y ago

jtriangle 2y ago

Mercifully, you don't really start forming strong memories until you're about 3-4, and your brain is gloriously plastic until around 23, so, to say 'that's the kind of trauma that stays with someone for their whole life' isn't really the case. They might be a little timid around water, but, get them in swim classes in a year or so, and they'll be zooming around in no time without a care in the world.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
lazyasciiart 2y ago
Unfortunately not true. Babies who experience trauma may never be able to tell you about it, but they will remember it the same way they remember that their parents are safe people: it shows up in their emotions, their nervous system, their reactions to stimuli that seem innocuous. In other words “there appears to be a reorganization of cognitive and memory functions such that narrative memory for events prior to age three or four are difficult to access later in life. These two points have led to the pervasive, inaccurate and destructive view that infants do not recall traumatic experience…” https://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_interest/child_law/resources/child_law_practiceonline/child_law_practice/vol-33/february-2014/special-considerations-for-traumatized-infants/ https://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_interest/child_law...
- navane 2y ago
  pretty sure that getting born trumps any trauma you can give a 2 yr old.
  - tux3 2y ago
    I'm not sure how you're so sure. People being born isn't a new development. If it were significantly harmful, evolutionary pressure would have had ample time to apply. On the other hand, I can think of plenty of trauma that wouldn't be good for a 2 year old child.
    - navane 2y ago
      On second thought, of course there is plenty of trauma you can give a two yr old, my brain happily didn't go there during my earlier reply. I meant by actions of a parent with good intentions.
- smeej 2y ago
  And if their parents aren't safe people, they remember that too. I experienced feeling truly, deeply, completely safe for the first time in my thirties. It rocked my world. Things almost didn't seem real immediately afterward, like I was dreaming. I compare it to visiting France when I could speak Spanish, but not French. My brain wanted to reply to people in "not English," so kept trying to spit out Spanish responses to French questions. My brain didn't have a context for "safe" other than "not real life," so it tried to react like I was dreaming. I don't want to go into all the details about what it's like to try to teach your parasympathetic nervous system how to come fully online when you're this far into adulthood, but I recommend making sure children do have somewhere they can practice coming down from stress way before they're my age.
  - MichaelZuo 2y ago
    But this is just a feeling, not reality? e.g. The risk of being instantly erased by a falling meteorite/random airplane part/space debris/etc. is never literally zero. Just very very low.
    - smeej 2y ago
      My sister died very suddenly, apparently fine one minute and irrecoverably dead the next. I know I'm never completely safe. Maybe the better term in this case is "protected," but I'm not sure. "This person, here with me, is not a threat to me, and I know that in my bones. Further, he would interpose himself between me and any threat that should arise in this moment." That's the feeling. Most people experience that as infants. Parents are supposed to love their children this way. And it's important for the neurological development of the parasympathetic nervous system. I just didn't get to until my thirties.
  - lazyasciiart 2y ago
    Absolutely: it’s only because of the tremendous impact of lacking felt safety as an infant that we know they can tell the difference.
NobodyNada 2y ago
I have strong memories of significant-to-me events that happened when I was 1-2 (moving houses, falling out of bed as an infant, getting scratched by the family cat, and the birth of my sister, just to name a few).
- sethammons 2y ago
  My earliest memory is at about 18 months. We dramatically underestimate the ability to think and reason for very young kids. Laying down memories included. I believe memories are more likely to set in when an experience is novel and new. Big events like you cite fall into that territory. I think a lot of those who can't remember things before age 5-6 is because they had extra-stable environments.
- TehShrike 2y ago
  What did you remember about the birth of your sister?
HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
Do you not have any memories from <3? This is obviously false. I have memories from when I was 2 that my parents also remember.
- lelanthran 2y ago
  > I have memories from when I was 2 that my parents also remember. I doubt it. How can you tell the difference between real memories and implanted memories[1]? Children as old as 11 have been successfully implanted with memories of things that never occurred by their parents, and who later testified that their parents told them nothing! [1] Your parents told you at age 4 what you did at age 2, you remembered the act because it was told to you, you don't remember the act of them telling you.
  - gnyman 2y ago
    No need to question the previous comments experiences. Is there really anything which is "certain" when it comes to memories? I'm not a memory expert, but as I recently read a book on the subject I think I have better than average understanding of it. If you can read Swedish or Finnish I do recommend it, the title is "Minnets Makt" by Julia Korkman (freely translated "The power of memory", official title is "Memory Dependent")[1]. The book taught me a lot about how memories work, how they are formed, recalled and modified during the years. And as memories are a core part of everyone's life, I think it would be good for more people to understand them better. I did find a youtube video where the author, does a short lecture meant for law enforcement to teach them the basics of how memories work. As for them it is even more important to understand how meories, especially the recall of memories work when they interview people. Disclaimer, I haven't watched it yet, only skimmed it but it does seem to cover the same concepts as in the book. I recommend spending 27 minutes watching it for anyone who's curious about how the memory work. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSyEs6feH0M&t=442s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSyEs6feH0M&t=442s [1] https://www.helsinkiagency.fi/memory-dependent/ https://www.helsinkiagency.fi/memory-dependent/
  - The_Colonel 2y ago
    > How can you tell the difference between real memories and implanted memories[1]? Let's say something emotionally significant happened to you at the age of 2. Because it was significant, you keep recalling it regularly, maybe every week or so. Recalling and thinking about the memory is also strengthening it (and often altering it). There's not enough time to forget it if you keep refreshing the memory of it (kinda like LRU cache). I have a couple of such early memories which I believe survived through this recall mechanism.
jajko 2y ago
None of what you wrote says there was no long lasting trauma, I am pretty confident there is even if onlyin subtle ways. Have you ever heard about sub-consiousness? People behaving erraticaly without really controlling this aspect. Ever met a person who was definitely not balanced down deep and even he/she couldnt point out why? I've met unfortunately many of those without even trying, they are all around us if you know what to look for/ask right questions. Good for OP for testing such an extreme stuff so rest of us dont have to mess up out kids. I would never do such tests on my small kids, even remote chances for something bad is just cruel. Also, he writes it takes even 3s to drown a child, while describing doing even more.
ordu 2y ago
> Mercifully, you don't really start forming strong memories until you're about 3-4 You do. It is just childhood amnesia kicks in at some point, and you lose an access to those memories. There is no accepted explanation what happens, I personally prefer the idea, that your memory qualitatively changes in spite of language acquisition, you get another (upgraded) way to access your memory, and then you forget the old (legacy) way. I like this explanation because my own memories from the time I was ~3 yo are strange (conditionally on I could reproduce them well and not to invent things), they are almost eidetic. But it doesn't matter to be frank, because your memories were active and accessible at some period of your life and they influenced your development already, maybe changing the development track completely. Father throwing his kind into a pool? Kid was terrified? It is a very emotional experience which is a betrayal of kid's trust, which probably will never be without limits again. It may destroy any trust to other humans as well. Though it may pass without any long term consequences also. People are unpredictable in this regard. But you'd better avoid such experiments with your kid. > your brain is gloriously plastic until around 23, so, to say 'that's the kind of trauma that stays with someone for their whole life' isn't really the case. Some things a sticky. If they are strong enough to change behavior at once, if the changed behavior becomes a habit, then habit will enable trauma to resist any brain's plasticity and ability to heal. And you know, it may be a very rational thing for a kid to stop trusting his father if the father can throw the kid into water just so without any thought of how kid will feel. Probably the kid should be wary around his father.
- The_Colonel 2y ago
  > I personally prefer the idea, that your memory qualitatively changes in spite of language acquisition, you get another (upgraded) way to access your memory, and then you forget the old (legacy) way. I like this explanation because my own memories from the time I was ~3 yo are strange (conditionally on I could reproduce them well and not to invent things), they are almost eidetic. I think people stick too much to the idea that human memory is kinda like computer memory. "Remembering" trauma could also mean that the brain's structure changes in some way as a result of trauma without necessarily recording how the event exactly went. Reminds me of a video of WW1 shell shocked soldiers I saw recently. It's not the exact memory record of the events which broke those men. Something more profound changed in their brain.
bowsamic 2y ago
Freud would like a word
danielbarla 2y ago
I can confirm from personal experience that traumatic experiences seem to transcend the mind-wipe that happens in mid-childhood. At a very early age, I had a form of Krupp, and some of my earliest memories are not being able to breathe, and the panic/anxiety of it. After several decades, it's something I hardly ever think about (somewhat backing up what you are saying), but I definitely remember it. I would also be hesitant to do this to kids on purpose. My son fell into a pool at the age of ~1, and was pulled out by my wife within a few seconds. However, he had a massive fear of water, and took a long time and concerted efforts to make him comfortable with learning to swim.
- saithound 2y ago
  If you had an infection of the upper airway that made it hard to breathe, you had croup. If there was a massive steel foundry pushing down on your chest, it was probably Krupp.
  - danielbarla 2y ago
    You're right (though it is actually spelled krupp in my language, and I assumed it would be the same in others, as it has no inherent meaning).
sdiupIGPWEfh 2y ago
> Mercifully, you don't really start forming strong memories until you're about 3-4... A popular misconception that needs to be challenged, and one that I fear encourages some non-negligible deal of neglect and abuse. Children under 4 years old have surprisingly excellent memories, extending years back. But something happens around age 4, possibly a burst of neurogenesis, which scrambles most of whatever episodic or autobiographical memory is in the brain. Other forms of memory endure the transition just fine. Motor skills are obviously retained, as are other life-long skills like how to speak (and for the hyper-literate, how to read). Acquired fears certainly survive, and though they can be overcome... they're still around to actually have to be overcome. Early childhood trauma, and especially abuse, absolutely leave an imprint, even if the events themselves are no longer clearly recalled.
smeej 2y ago
I'd recommend reading Bessel van der Kolk's The Body Keeps the Score. The conscious mind is far from the only place the body stores memory that can impact us later in life.

wruza 2y ago

Idk if I was exposed to it like that, but I hate waters and don’t understand how the risk of death by drowning can be seen as “something fun”. I can swim to the shore if thrown out of boat, but see your deep bath “fun” as a group suicide tickling event. One choke, leg cramp, kick in the head and you’re in grave danger. I’d better walk the border on the roof rather than swimming through somewhere I can’t stand up.

graynk 2y ago

One of my first memories is drowning. We were going down the river and our plot crashed into a fallen tree and turned over. I was in a life saving jacket and I was about 3 or 4 years old. I remember the sun shining through the green-ish water, but I don’t remember being afraid at all. I was quickly fished out and then I just sat on that same tree and wiggled my legs and enjoyed myself while everyone else scrambled to save the things from swimming away. I’m also pretty sure that I was thrown into the sea to teach me to swim at some point, but I have no recollection of that, just stories from my parents. That is to say - I love swimming and feel positively untraumatized by the whole thing, even though it is scary in retrospect. Everyone’s experience is different, just my anecdata point to add.

ygra 2y ago
For me it was my swimming instructor in school that just pushed me into the water when I was afraid to jump in. I can swim, but I never got any of the swimming badges and I'm to this day (30+ years later) very uncomfortable with my head under water or even water in my face.

bowsamic 2y ago

He SHOULD see water as threatening

twixfel 2y ago
But not his own father! Running dangerous experiments on your child without their consent is surely at best extremely unethical. To me it sounds positively sick, or in layman terms, psychopathic.
- 392 2y ago
  Every generation before me was taught to swim by being tossed in a pond. It's a dangerous world. Pretending it isn't just lowers the minimum required stress before anxiety takes over.
  - smeej 2y ago
    Why add dangers, though? Even just perceived ones? It's perfectly possible to teach children to swim without giving them the experience of fearing for their lives.
  - twixfel 2y ago
    Yes the world is a little bit more dangerous for that kid at least. At any moment his father might throw him in a lake with neither consent nor warning. I never had to worry about my parents experimenting on me and I simply learned to swim with lessons. Lucky me to have had such parents. What makes it worse is that OP described it as an experiment that was primarily for his benefit, because he wanted to see what it would look like to see kid drowning. No word of wanting his kid to learn something (which still wouldn’t have been ok but at least barely makes a tiny bit of sense). That is mental, and child abuse.
  - 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y ago
    Coincidentally the older people who grew up that way and are proud of it are unbearable pricks
  - 2y ago

blarg1 2y ago

I still have my first memory of going in a pool, I just jumped straight in and I was doing kind of star jumps with my head popping in and out of the water, while my mum took her sweet arse time fishing me out. I remember being annoyed at that for a while lol.

sentfromrevolut 2y ago
[dead]

madaxe_again 2y ago

I’ve let my toddler fall in the pool - the first few times were enough, and she’s now really careful anywhere near it - and still perfectly comfortable with getting in the water appropriately, with a parent. As for trauma - it really depends. In her case, pretty sure she’s fine as in each case she was promptly rescued and as mentioned, no aversion to water, just to falling in. In my case - I managed to have an earnest crack at drowning nearly a decade ago, aged 30 or so, and it hasn’t left me. Swimming between two small tropical islands. Tide changed. Calm waters suddenly became ferocious chop, and I swiftly realised I was being swept out to sea, and couldn’t fight the current - and I’m a respectable swimmer. Panic set in faster than I care to admit as I realised that I was pretty fucked. Thank my lucky stars, someone was watching me, and appeared with a rib as I was starting to take lungfuls of water. I was purple, coughing up and vomiting seawater, sobbing. Humbling. I’ve no problem with water in general since, but the ocean now scares the shit out of me, and I won’t get in it.

meheleventyone 2y ago

Particularly as it’s something you can easily learn about without doing that!

tmcdos 2y ago

I have such a trauma. When I was at 2nd grade in primary school, they were bringing us to the nearest pool at a stadium for swimming lessons. The teacher was asking us to jump one by one in the water and to try getting closer to a life-bouye. Most of my schoolmates were able to catch the bouye but at the moment I jumped in the water, I froze and started sinking. I was able to feel how the teacher touched a long metal stick to my arm which I grabbed and she pulled me out. Then she yelled at me why have not I tried to swim. I will never forget this experience. After 40 years, I still can not swim.